Encyclopedia o f Chicago
Interpretive Digital Essay : Globalization: Chicago and the World
Globalization: Chicago and the World
Essay: Introduction
Essay: Chicago in the Middle Ground
Map: Chicago's World—Within a Day's Travel
Essay: Global Chicago
Galleries:
Colonial Trans-Atlantic Networks
A Cosmopolitan Frontier
Global Capitalism and Chicago Real Estate
Built Environment in a Mercantile Metropolis
Networks of Rails
World's Columbian Exposition of 1893
Turn-of-the-Century Industrialization and International Markets
The Chicago Region and Its Global Models
An Upstart Behemoth
Mailing To the World
The World in Chicago
Chicago's Twentieth-Century Cultural Exports
"The Whole World Is Watching"
Corporate Headquarters and Industrial Relics
Map: Changing Origins of Metropolitan Chicago's Foreign-Born Population
Biography of Mark Beaubien in History of Chicago, A. T. Andreas, 1884
Return to "Chicago in the Middle Ground"

Mark Beaubien was one of the few ferry keepers in the Chicago area. He arrived in Chicago in 1826 from Detroit to visit his older brother Jean Baptiste Beaubien, a trader at Fort Dearborn. Mark and his wife Monique decided to make their home at Chicago. They bought a small cabin from James Kinzie and in 1831 built the first frame structure in Chicago, the Sauganash Hotel. The couple operated the hotel (which was far from a solitary life) for several years on the Chicago River just south of Wolf Point (the confluence of the north and south branches into the main stem). Also in 1831, Beaubien became the first ferry-keeper at Chicago. He was on call night and day to ferry travelers across the Chicago River. Later, Beaubien also served several terms as a lighthouse keeper on the Chicago River and as a toll keeper along a plank road in Du Page County.